WHEREAS: Dominion Virginia Power is the largest vertically integrated energy company in the Commonwealth of Virginia providing a full array of energy-related operations and services, such as the generation, transmission, distribution and marketing of electricity.

In 2007 Virginia enacted a voluntary renewable energy portfolio goal to achieve the equivalent of 15% of its 2007 non-nuclear electric sales from renewable energy technologies by the year 2025. In 2009 the Commonwealth expanded the goal by allowing investor-owned utilities such as Dominion Virginia Power to recover costs to achieve that goal and earn an increased rate of return on those investments. Electric generation from onshore wind and solar receive a double credit toward the goal and offshore wind receives a triple credit.

To date within Virginia, Dominion Virginia Power has only used hydro and biomass projects in order to achieve the renewable energy portfolio goal. The hydro projects were built decades ago and using them for compliance with the renewable energy portfolio goal does not provide any additional benefits to residents of the state. The public health and environmental damages of burning biomass can be much worse than wind, solar, and other renewable energy options that Dominion Virginia Power could utilize, destroying forests and producing costly pollution.

By contrast investment by wind and solar in the Commonwealth of Virginia would have numerous public health, environmental, and economic benefits for the state. The Virginia Coastal Energy Research Consortium has calculated that if Virginia’s investor owned utilities, including Dominion Virginia Power, developed 3,200 MW of Virginia’s offshore wind potential they could help create from 9,700 to 11,600 career-length jobs over the next two decades. A study by Virginia’s electric grid operator PJM found that developing 15,000 MW of wind in the region would reduce carbon pollution by 35 million tons and reduce wholesale energy market prices up to $4.74 billion annually, providing massive savings for customers.

Unfortunately, despite the potential environmental and economic benefits for the Commonwealth, essentially none of Dominion Resources’ operation of wind and solar capacity to date has been within Virginia.

RESOLVED: Shareholders request that Dominion Resources publish a report, at reasonable cost and omitting proprietary information, by February, 2013 assessing the economic and environmental benefits for the Commonwealth of Virginia of the company developing electrical generation equivalent to 15% of Dominion Virginia Power’s sales from wind and solar power facilities within the Commonwealth of Virginia and coastal waters by 2025.